by Chris Carmona

Created on: November 27, 2007   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

If college basketball in March is Madness then what we are seeing now is just nutty.

We first saw No. 20 Kentucky fall to Gardner-Webb. Quick, what is Gardner-Webb's mascot? Try the Runnin' Bulldogs. If you've ever seen bulldogs run you know that they can only go for a short period of time before getting exhausted. That's exactly what has happened to Gardner-Webb; since laying a beating on the Wildcats the Dogs are a mere 2-4.

How about USC and their freshman dandy O.J Mayo? A lot was expected of this team even though star Nick Young left early for the draft. USC started their season off in grand fashion as they dropped to the Mercer Bears. The Bears haven't won a game since starting off (0-4).

Other ranked freshman led teams, Kansas State and Michael Beasley dropped one to George Mason, while Indiana and Eric Gordon collapsed to the Muketeers at Xavier. Big East Favorites Louisville fell to surprise BYU.

Not good enough yet? How bout No. 12 Oregon dropping to Saint Mary's College. Gonzaga almost dropped one to Western Kentucky and Villanova only beating their last three opponents by an average of 7 points. Speaking of close games, look at all those teams playing against No. 1 UNC. Davidson and BYU took UNC to the wire in each of their games. Virginia dropped one to Seton Hall and defending National Champion Florida lost to Florida State. (Why Florida wasn't at least ranked to start the season is a debate for another day. I don't care what talent they lose, any team that wins the title in the previous year is the best team until someone knocks them off.)

Other ranked teams dropping early include Arizona, Arkansas, Stanford, and North Carolina State.

It's just nutty. This season is like a scene from the movie Momento where nothing is in order and it's just confusing until the very end (Last year in March we saw very few upsets). Maybe it's too early to talk about all these upsets thus far in the season. Granted this isn't college football where upsets are less likely to happen (exception being this season), but right now it seems like every team on any night has a chance to win.

This has all been in the making since the Cinderellas have done big things in March. 5-10 years ago many people didn't know what the WCC was, but now that Gonzaga has emerged other teams are following suit.

Next conference up and coming is the Mountain West Conference (MWC). It is going to be hard to turn down some of these teams come selection Sunday. The Missouri Valley Conference (MVC) has been making their case for being a top conference the past few years and could be a force again this year.

So as Nutty November concludes you can expect much of the same to continue throughout the season. Usually there are a handful of teams above the rest but this year it doesn't seem so obvious.

I am going to go on record now and give you my Final Four teams just so that when March comes I can hear people saying, "Wow, you picked them?! They are horrible!"

My 4: UCLA, Michigan State, Memphis, Texas

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